Welsh Office: Tribunal of Inquiry into the Aberfan Disaster 1966: Records

BD 52

1876-1968

This series contains the records of the Tribunal of Inquiry into the Aberfan Disaster of 1966.

The records include copies of all the written evidence presented to the tribunal, experts' reports, statements of evidence, the verbatim notes made by the Treasury reporters, minutes of evidence and supporting reports, and various plans, maps and photographs, including a number of aerial photographs of the site. A copy of the final version of the tribunal's report is in BD 52/154.

The files are listed in the following order: verbatim reports, list of witnesses and supporting documents and maps and plans. The references noted as former references are the tribunal's references as they were presented as evidence.

For correspondence relating to the Aberfan tip disaster, see COAL 73 WORK 45/411 HLG 89/1103

Additional information, including school registers, and minutes of meetings of the management committee and sub-committees of the disaster fund set up by the Mayor of Merthyr Tydfil are in the Glamorgan Record Office, Cardiff. Material relating to the inquiry will also be found in:

Public Record(s)

English

185 files and flat sheets

Open

Topics

Maps and plans

Disasters and emergencies

The Aberfan tip disaster occurred on 21 October 1966 and claimed the lives of 116 children and 28 adults. On 25 October resolutions were passed in both Houses of Parliament to the effect that a tribunal of inquiry should be established. In pursuance of these resolutions a warrant was issued on 26 October by the Secretary of State for Wales appointing such a tribunal under section 1 of the Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act 1921. The tribunal was chaired by Rt Hon Lord Justice Edmund Davies. The secretariat for the tribunal was provided by the Welsh Office. A preliminary meeting was held on 8 November and the tribunal sat in public on 76 days from 29 November 1966 to 28 April 1967, initially at Merthyr Tydfil and later at Cardiff. The report of the tribunal was published during 1967.

A duplicate set of these records can be found in the National Library of Wales.